Teenage Golf Pro Moves From the Hinterlands to the PGA Tour

BETHESDA, Md. — Jordan Spieth appeared well on his way to stardom when he won his second United States Junior Amateur championship in 2011. He became the second golfer to win the tournament multiple times, joining some guy named Tiger Woods. But if expectations weighed on Spieth, it did not show, at least not during his freshman season at the University of Texas, where he promptly led the Longhorns to a national championship.

So when Spieth, 19, decided to turn professional in December, it might have seemed like the next logical step, except that Spieth said the decision was a difficult one. He had come up short in his bid to earn an automatic spot on the PGA Tour at qualifying school, which meant he would probably face a long haul toward legitimacy on the Web.com Tour. Spieth being Spieth, he was willing to take the risk.

Sure enough, he found himself scrambling in the first round of the Panama Claro Championship in late February. Forget the PGA Tour. Spieth was fighting for survival in golf’s swampy hinterlands. He was four over par through his first seven holes, and he needed to drain a 12-foot putt to save par. In a few short weeks, he had gone from teenage virtuoso to, in his words, “busting my butt on the Web.com Tour.” It was, if nothing else, an education.

Spieth exhaled, sank the putt and went on to finish the tournament in a tie for seventh.

“Who knows how I would’ve bounced back had the bogey streak continued,” he said.

It was a turning point for Spieth, whose performance in Panama fueled a rapid rise toward golf’s upper echelon. Having earned temporary member status on the PGA Tour thanks to a series of solid efforts, Spieth hopes to be a factor at this week’s AT&T National. His assets — long and accurate off the tee, with an improving short game — seem suited to Congressional Country Club, which checks in at a knee-buckling 7,569 yards.

“When I tee off now in these events, I don’t have the same nerves,” Spieth said. “I feel a lot more comfortable.”

Now armed with four top-10 finishes in 13 starts this season (and $919,079 in prize money), Spieth spent hours Tuesday working through the clubs in his bag at the driving range, his swing smooth and compact in 95-degree heat. His right hand featured several calluses that he had built up over the years, including one on the large knuckle of his ring finger that was the size of a marble.

“This finger is kind of deformed,” he said. “I mean, it’s just skin. I can tug on it.” He tugged on it. “It does help me get my grip a little better.”

Cameron McCormick, Spieth’s swing coach and the director of instruction at Brook Hollow Golf Club in Dallas, cited the calluses as evidence of Spieth’s work ethic. Golfers get calluses. It is an occupational hazard. But few have calluses that are as robust as Spieth’s. His calluses have calluses.

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Jordan Spieth has four top-10 finishes in 13 starts before the AT&T National this week.CreditJulio Cortez/Associated Press

“If you have a passion for the game without wanting to spend all the hours of labor working at your craft, you’re going to find it tough to rise to the top of any level, whether it’s amateur or professional,” McCormick said in a telephone interview. “And I think he’s realizing just how difficult it is to climb all the way to the top of the world at the professional level. But that whets his appetite even more.”

At the urging of a family friend, Spieth began to work with McCormick four weeks shy of his 13th birthday. Their first meeting doubled as an evaluation. McCormick took Spieth to the range so he could study his mechanics. Despite never having much formal instruction, Spieth showcased a wonderful, if slightly inconsistent, knack for shaping the ball with his irons. McCormick said he knew, even then, that Spieth had capabilities that were unusual for a player so inexperienced.

McCormick later took Spieth out onto the course, where he tested his mental toughness with a short-game contest. McCormick dangled a prize — a hat and T-shirt — as incentive. Spieth struggled and wound up needing to pull off a miracle with his final two chips. His first landed an inch from the cup. He sank his second.

“That was my first are-you-kidding-me moment,” McCormick said.

John Fields, the men’s golf coach at Texas, said he was struck by how determined Spieth was to stay in the present as a college player. He was not maneuvering himself for a pro career. He was not thinking about what was next. In fact, Fields said, whenever reporters interviewed Spieth, he pre-empted questions about his future by saying he was at Texas to win a national championship. Fields said Spieth’s approach lifted the entire team.

“It was this whole idea that what he was doing at that moment was particularly important to him, and there wasn’t anything else,” Fields said.

Yet when he turned pro, Spieth knew he needed a plan. McCormick anticipated that Spieth would experience growing pains in his first few tournaments. There would be pressure, McCormick said. Pressure from the news media, eager to see how Spieth would deal with a new set of circumstances. Pressure from his sponsors, perceived or real. And, of course, all the pressure that Spieth would invariably put on himself.

“We knew he probably wouldn’t be in a position to play as well as he possibly wanted at the start of the year,” McCormick said. “But two or three events in, he was going to start feeling more comfortable. So the things we put in place were going to help him peak in three, four five weeks, rather than in January.”

After his comeback in Panama, Spieth took advantage of a sponsor’s exemption to compete at the Puerto Rico Open — a PGA Tour event — in early March. His jangled nerves were gone. His confidence was back. He finished in a tie for second at 19 under par. “I just kind of got it going,” he said.

At the Tampa Bay Championship the next weekend, Spieth once again placed in the top 10 — a result that meant that his days on the Web.com Tour were most likely finished. His winnings were enough to secure unlimited sponsor’s exemptions for the remainder of the PGA Tour season, a turn of events that Spieth considered surreal. He highlighted his strong finish with a chip-in at No. 17, known on tour as the notorious Hooters Owl’s Nest.

“Everyone is drunk and falling over, and it’s as loud as can be,” Spieth said. “That was just one of the best golf moments of my life.”